Tinyville Town

Tinyville Town is a series of books I’m working on that will be published by Appleseed, an Abrams imprint. The books tell stories that all take place in and around the fictional community of Tinyville Town. Think Sesame Street mixed with Fisher-Price toys.

(click on any of the images to enlarge)

The series will consist of at least eight books (the number I’m currently contracted to write and draw) and will hopefully be as many as a few dozen in the end. There are two kinds of books currently planned in the series. I’m referring to them as “the little ones” and “the big ones” for lack of a better nomenclature.

The little ones are small-format board books that are each about an individual member of the town. The first two books, for example, will be I’m a Firefighter and I’m a Veterinarian. I plan six of these books, initially. Librarian will be fourth, with Police officer, Doctor, Mayor, and Teacher possibly following. We follow one person in a typical “day-in-the-life” of that occupation. Each book begins with the character waking up and beginning their day, and ends with them going back to sleep. The firefighter puts out a fire and cooks dinner for his crew. The veterinarian examines a dog and figures out what is wrong. The hook here is that the occupations interact with each other and cross paths throughout their days. So the fire the firefighter puts out is at the bakery. The dog that the vet sees is Flash, the firefighter’s dalmatian.
As you can imagine, it would be difficult to run out of material for these books. Though, sadly, occupations like I’m a Data Processor and I’m a Venture Capitalist might not be right for Tinyville Town.

The big books are proper large-format picture books, and rather than focus on one individual, they show how these various people in the town all come together to do something or build something. The first book in this series will be called Tinyville Town Builds a Bridge. At the beginning of this story, the mayor of Tinyville Town is taking a walk and sees a huge traffic jam that extends across the old bridge over the river. He realizes that the town is growing and needs a newer, bigger bridge. He works with the engineers of the town to plan the bridge, and the construction crew to build it. We also see how others get involved, such as a journalist reporting about the construction, and the people who the new bridge will affect, like the bus driver, the fisherman, and the firefighter. While some details of bridge building and engineering where find their way into the story, the book is less about “how bridges are built” and more about how this town works together to build something for the common good.